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Writer deploys home-cooked large language models to power up enterprise copy

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There’s a lot of noise right now about how generative AIs like ChatGPT and Bard are going to revolutionize various aspects of the web, but companies targeting narrower verticals are already experiencing success. Writer is such a one, and it just announced a new trio of large language models to power its enterprise copy assistant.

The company lets customers fine-tune these models on their own content and style guides, from which point forward the AI can write, help write, or edit copy so that it meets internal standards. More than just catching typos and recommending the preferred word, Writer’s new models can evaluate style and write content themselves, even doing a bit of fact-checking when they’re done.

But the real draw is that the whole thing can be done internally, from fine-tuning to hosting, at least when it comes to the smaller two of the Palmyra series of models.

“No enterprise leader wants their data to be fodder for someone else’s foundation model, including ours,” said CEO May Habib in a press release. “We give customers all the benefits of the AI application layer without any of the risks of other AI applications and commercial models. Enterprise leaders want to invest in solutions that will essentially give them their own LLM.”

Palymra comes in three sizes: 128 million, 5 billion, or 20 billion parameters respectively for Small, Base, and Large. They’re trained on business and marketing writing, not Reddit posts and Project Gutenberg, so there are less surprises to begin with. Then you load up its maw with the last ten years of annual reports, financials, blog posts, and so on to make it yours. (This and any derived data do not filter back to Writer, to be clear.)

Having written my share of enterprise and marketing copy, I can say this isn’t the most exciting of applications. But what it lacks in thrills it makes up for in practicality: companies need to do lots of this kind of writing and editing, and tend to actually pay for it. Writer already hooks into lots of development and productivity suites, so there’s not much friction added.

Mockup of Writer generating a product description.

The business model is similar to other generative AI companies: you get all set up and fine-tuned for free, then pay a penny per thousand tokens, which gets you about 750 words. (This article is just over 500, as a quick reference.)

Alternatively, you can self-hose the Small or Base models free of charge if you have the compute.

A few dozen companies have been using the models since late last year, and we haven’t heard about any egregious problems like we did on day one of Microsoft and Google’s attempts at popularizing generative AI… so that’s a good sign. This is the success of which I spoke earlier. While ChatGPT is certainly impressive, as a generalist or dilettante AI it’s hard to say what it’s actually capable of being used for. The next year or two will see more targeted plays like Writers while Microsoft and Google kick the tires on their latest toy.

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Just 7 days until the TC Early Stage early bird flies away

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Budget-minded entrepreneurs and early-stage startup founders take heed — this is no time to procrastinate. We have only 7 days left of early-bird pricing to TechCrunch Early Stage 2023 in Boston on April 20.

Don’t wait…the early bird gets the…SAVINGS: Buy a $249 founder pass and save $200 before prices increase on April 1 — that’s no joke.

TC Early Stage is our only event where you get hands-on training with experts to help your business succeed. No need to reinvent the startup wheel — you’ll have access to leading experts across a range of specialties.

During this one-day startup bootcamp, you’ll learn about legal issues, fundraising, marketing, growth, product-market fit, pitching, recruiting and more. We’re talking more than 40 highly engaging presentations, workshops and roundtables with interactive Q&As and plenty of time for networking.

Here are just a few examples of the topics we have on tap. You’ll find plenty more listed in the event agenda.

How to Tell Your TAM: Dayna Grayson from Construct Capital invests in the rebuilding of the most foundational and broken industries of our economy. Industries such as manufacturing and logistics, among others, that formed in an analog world have been neglected by advanced technology. Dayna will talk about how, beyond the idea, founders can pitch investors on their TAM, including how they will wedge into the market and how they will eventually disrupt it.

How to Think About Accelerators and Incubators: Founders often hear they should get involved with an incubator or accelerator, but when is the “right” time for early-stage founders to apply to these types of startup support ecosystems, and how can they best engage if accepted? In this talk, Harvard Innovation Labs executive director Matt Segneri will cover everything from the types of incubators and accelerators available to early-stage founders, to what startups should consider before applying, and tips for getting the most out of these ecosystems.

How to Raise Outside of SV in a Down Market: Silicon Valley’s funding market tends to be more immune to macroeconomic conditions than elsewhere in the world. So how do you raise outside the Valley bubble? General Catalyst’s Mark Crane has ample experience on both the founder and VC side from all over Europe, as well as a firm understanding of the funding landscape in the northeastern U.S., so he’ll give practical advice on how to stay alive and thrive.

At TechCrunch Early Stage you’ll walk away with a deeper working understanding of topics and skills that are essential to startup success. Founders save $200 with an early-bird founder ticketcollege students pay just $99!

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Twitter will kill ‘legacy’ blue checks on April 1

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Twitter has picked April Fool’s Day, otherwise known as April 1, to start removing legacy blue checkmarks from the platform.

Despite the significance of the day Twitter chose, the removal of legacy checkmarks has been anticipated for months now. Musk tweeted in December that the company would remove those checks “in a few months” because “the way in which they were given out was corrupt and nonsensical.”

Since then, legacy blue checkmark holders have been seeing a pop-up when they click on their checkmark that reads, “This is a legacy verified account. It may or may not be notable.”

Before Musk acquired the company, Twitter used checkmarks to verify individuals and entities as active, authentic and notable accounts of interest. Verified checkmarks were doled out for free.

Today, Twitter users can purchase a blue check through the Twitter Blue subscription model for $8 per month (iOS and Android signups will cost $11 per month, due to app store costs). There are also other checkmark colors and badges available for purchase to denote whether an account is a business or a government, for example.

Twitter says the purchase of a checkmark gives users access to subscriber-only features like fewer ads on their timeline, prioritized ranking in conversations, bookmark folders, and the ability to craft long tweets, edit tweets and undo tweets.

The news comes within hours of Twitter also announcing the availability of the Blue subscription globally.

Twitter did not respond to TechCrunch’s request for more information about how many users have already signed up for Twitter Blue.

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Roofstock, valued at $1.9B last year, cuts 27% of staff in second round of layoffs

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Proptech company Roofstock has laid off about 27% of its staff today, according to an email sent to employees viewed by TechCrunch. The cuts come just five months after the startup laid off 20% of its workforce.

The company’s website states that it has 400+ employees, or “Roofsters” as they’re dubbed, but it is not known if that figure is current.

Roofstock, an online marketplace for investing in leased single-family rental homes, one year ago raised $240 million at a $1.9 billion valuation. SoftBank Vision Fund 2 led that financing, which included participation from existing and new backers including Khosla Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Bain Capital Ventures and others. Roofstock has raised a total of over $365 million in funding since its 2015 inception, per Crunchbase.

According to the email seen by TechCrunch, co-founder and CEO Gary Beasley said today’s reduction in force (RIF) was “in response to the challenging macro environment” and the “negative impact” it is having on Roofstock’s business.

He added that the company was not expecting to have to cut more staff so soon but that it needed to “right size” in an effort “to reduce cash burn rate” and ensure it has “adequate capital runway until the market eventually turns.”

Beasley sent the email because apparently, the Zoom meeting where it was addressed “maxed out on attendees.”

Oakland, Calif.-based Roofstock lets people buy and sell rental homes in dozens of U.S. markets. The premise behind the company is that both institutional and retail investors can buy and sell homes without forcing renters to leave their homes. Meanwhile, buyers can also presumably generate income from day one. 

At the time of its raise in March 2022, the company said that it had facilitated more than $5 billion in transaction volume, more than half of which had come from the last year alone.

Just days before its last round of layoffs last year, Roofstock made headlines for selling its first single-family home using NFTs, or non-fungible tokens.

Rising mortgage rates and a slowdown in the housing market led to challenges for many real estate technology companies in 2022 that continue this year. Opendoor, Redfin, Compass, Better.com and Homeward were among the other startups that also laid off workers. IBuyer Reali also announced it was shutting down after raising $100 million the year prior.

TechCrunch has reached out to Roofstock but had not heard back at the time of writing but multiple sources confirmed that layoffs had taken place today.

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